FIPSE
1990 K Street, N.W., 6th Floor
Washington DC 20006-8544
Telephone: (202) 502-7500
Fax: (202) 502-7877
E-mail: fipse@ed.gov
Web Site: www.ed.gov/ope/fipse/index.html

ACTING DIRECTOR

• Ralph Hines

  Ralph joined the FIPSE staff in May 2007. Prior to his assignment to FIPSE, he served as Director of the Department's International Education Programs Service, which administers the international education programs authorized under Title VI of the Higher Education Act (HEA) and Section 102(b)(6) of the Fulbright-Hays Act. As such, he managed the major federal programs dedicated to the maintenance and development of a national capacity in foreign language, area studies, and international business. Ralph has held a variety of administrative, programmatic, and management positions during his 37-year tenure with the Department's Title VI international education programs. He has served the public in a great variety of professional activities, including work on inter-governmental advisory groups and task forces in the United States and abroad focusing on the federal effort in the field of international training and exchanges. His professional activities have included travel and consultations in the Americas, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and the Caribbean. He holds B.A. and M.A. degrees from Norfolk State University and the George Washington University, respectively, and a Senior Executive Fellows certificate from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

  (202) 502-7618
  ralph.hines@ed.gov

PROGRAM STAFF

• Sarah Beaton
  Program Officer and Coordinator, U.S.-Brazil Program

  Sarah joined the FIPSE staff in July 2007. Prior to this position, Sarah served as Team Leader of the International Studies Team, in the International Education Programs Service. Sarah directed seven discretionary grant programs with an annual budget of over $30 million and a staff of nine to improve the academic teaching of area studies, foreign languages, and international business. Her background includes the study of economics, liberal arts, and business both at home and abroad. She received her B.S. in Business and Economics from the College of New Rochelle and M.A. in International Studies from George Mason University. She is an enthusiastic internationalist and uses her influence and talents to help develop sustainable and creative international programs at universities and colleges throughout the United States. She is currently the coordinator of the U.S.-Brazil Higher Education Consortia Program.

  (202) 502-7612
  sarah.beaton@ed.gov

• Claire Cornell
  Program Officer and Coordinator, Underground Railroad Educational and Cultural Program

  Claire joined FIPSE in January 2008. Over more than 25 years she has worked with federal, state, and foundation grants in bioscience, physical science, engineering, mathematics, humanities, and social science disciplines; developed and managed grants offices; and provided grant consulting for higher education institutions, non-profits, and state government agencies. At the University of Iowa, Claire directed the grants office of the Liberal Arts College, Business College, Graduate College, and University Libraries. She also designed and administered grants offices for the University of South Carolina’s College of Science and Mathematics, the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration, and for health and science non-profit organizations. While serving as the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Federal Grants Division Director, Claire developed strategic plans for government-business-academic partners that convened teams from the banking, agribusiness, biotechnology and biomedical research sectors, and from government.

  Claire has published in business education and public health peer-reviewed journals. Claire holds a Bachelors Degree in English Literature from Queens College, CUNY. While transitioning into grants development, she completed science prerequisite courses at Luther College, in Decorah, Iowa and graduate courses in both early childhood education and nutrition at the University of Iowa.

  (202) 502-7609
  claire.cornell@ed.gov

• Cassandra H. Courtney
  Program Officer and Coordinator, Comprehensive Program

  Cassandra joined the FIPSE staff in 1994. She came to FIPSE from Wilberforce University in Ohio where, over 13 years, she served as a member of the faculty, Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Vice President for Adult and Continuing Education. While in Ohio she was an active member of the Accreditation Review Council and a member of the consultant-evaluator corps of the North Central Association. She is a 1989 graduate of Harvard's Institute on Educational Management and earned the Ph.D. in educational psychology at The Pennsylvania State University with concentrations in applied statistics and educational assessment. Her undergraduate degree was completed at Wilson College, a liberal arts college for women in Pennsylvania. Cassandra served for two years as FIPSE's Deputy Director. She currently serves as coordinator of the Comprehensive Program.

  (202) 502-7506
  cassandra.courtney@ed.gov

• Bette Dow
  Program Officer and Coordinator, Congressionally-directed Grants

  Bette joined FIPSE in mid-2003, coming from OPE's Accreditation and State Liaison unit. Prior to joining federal service in 2000, she lived in Beijing, China, where she served as CEO for the development of a postsecondary MBA and executive management training programs for a China-USA joint venture. Bette's academic background includes a Ph.D., M.A., & B.A., in Psychology and a postdoctoral degree, Ed.M. in Administration, Planning and Social Policy, with an emphasis in quantitative/qualitative evaluations. Bette grew up in Ecuador and Chile, but spent most of her adult life in California. She has worked as a private practitioner in clinical psychology, vocational psychologist for the California Department of Rehabilitation, Acting Dean for the Education and Psychology Departments for National University, Sacramento, postsecondary education specialist for the Council for Private Postsecondary Education in California, consultant to postsecondary institutions on accreditation/licensing issues, and legislative advocate for a California Association for Counseling and Development. Bette has taught graduate-level courses at National University, Chapman University, and CSU-Sacramento in areas of organizational development, tests and measurements, operant conditioning, social psychology, psychology for managers, and values and ethics. Bette's primary responsibilities are as coordinator of Congressionally-directed Grants and as a program officer with the Comprehensive Program.

  (202) 502-7835
  bette.dow@ed.gov

• Donald Fischer
  Program Officer

  Don joined the FIPSE Comprehensive Program staff in 1996. He has been with the Department since 1973, working first as a planning and policy analyst in educational research and development, and later as an administrator in the Department's office of R&D centers and regional educational laboratories. From 1986-1994, he was a program officer in the FIPSE-affiliated higher education drug prevention program, and during 1994-1995, helped establish a challenge grants program to increase the use of computer technology in elementary and secondary education. He currently oversees FIPSE's online grants database and monitors Comprehensive Program grants. He holds a B.A. in French from Stanford.

  (202) 502-7508
  donald.fischer@ed.gov

• Frank Frankfort
  Program Officer and Coordinator, North American and EU-U.S. Atlantis Programs

  Frank joined the FIPSE staff in September 1994. After receiving his doctorate in Medieval Studies, he taught History at Westminster College (PA) for fourteen years. From 1987 to the present he has been in the Washington area, first as a program officer at the National Endowment for the Humanities, then as a Professor of Humanities and Dean of Arts and Sciences at Hood College. His special interests include globalization and the impact on higher education and comparative educational systems. He is currently the coordinator of the European Union-United States Atlantis Program and the Program for North American Mobility in Higher Education.

  (202) 502-7513
  frank.frankfort@ed.gov

• Susan Lehmann
  Education Research Analyst/Program Evaluator

  Susan Lehmann comes to FIPSE as an Education Research Analyst specializing in program evaluation and assessment. She previously worked for nine years as Research Director at American Councils for International Education: ACTR/ACCELS. During that time she had a consulting practice which held external evaluation contracts with NAFSA: Association for International Educators, Title VI, FIPSE, the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the U.S. Department of State, Title VIII, the GAO, and the Ford Foundation. Between 1992 and 1999 she was Assistant Professor of Sociology at Columbia University and a faculty member of the W. Averell Harriman Institute. Dr. Lehmann has co-authored Research Methods in Cyberspace: Internet Exercises for Social Science Research Courses and The 1996 Russian Presidential Election. She has published articles on Islam, ethnicity, an inter-ethnic conflict in Russia, the religious values of young Russians, changing neighborhood preference in Post-Soviet Russian cities, the impact of social origins on political attitudes in Russia, and an analysis of Russian employment and unemployment. She speaks Russian fluently and has traveled to Russia 26 times since 1987 to conduct field research, surveys and focus groups. She holds a Masters and a Ph.D. in Sociology from Harvard University and a B.A. in Sociology from Bryn Mawr College.

  (202) 502-7516
  susan.lehmann@ed.gov

• Krishan (Krish) Mathur
  Program Officer and Coordinator, U.S.-Russia Program

  Krish joined FIPSE in November 2007, after serving in the Office of the Chief Information Officer in Federal Student Aid as a project manager for two years. Previously, he taught in academia for 26 years and worked as an information technology (IT) project manager in the IT industry for seven years. He earned a B.S. and M.S. in Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and Ph.D. in Computer Aided Design (CAD) from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland. Being a part of the new and evolving field of CAD since its inception in the late sixties, he has developed new curricula and taught at universities in the United Kingdom, the United States, Malaysia, and Singapore. He served at the university and national level committees for the introduction of CAD and IT in undergraduate teaching. He was a member of a governmental initiative to provide a national information infrastructure for the city-state of Singapore. His teaching and research areas include CAD; artificial intelligence; construction engineering, economics, and management; architectural design; building sciences; systems engineering; and management sciences. Krish has co-authored books, book chapters, and over 70 publications as refereed papers, journal articles, and conference papers. He is on the editorial board of a number of IT and engineering refereed journals. He is currently the coordinator of the U.S.-Russia Program and a program officer in the Comprehensive Program.

  (202) 502-7512
  krish.mathur@ed.gov

SUPPORT STAFF

• Beverly Baker
  Program Support Staff

  Beverly's work at FIPSE focuses on providing the logistical support for all three of FIPSE's international programs and the Underground Railroad Program. She was awarded the "Secretary's Anchor Award" for her services to the Department of Education in 1996.

  (202) 502-7503
  beverly.baker@ed.gov

• Cindy Fisher
  Program Support Staff

  Cindy came to the Department of Education in 1987 and worked in several other program offices, including the Federal Student Aid, Pell Grants, and Federal Direct Student Loan Programs, and in the Office of the Assistant Secretary. She joined FIPSE in 1996. Cindy's primary responsibility is for grant closeouts.

  (202) 502-7509
  cindy.fisher@ed.gov

• Levenia Ishmell
  Program Support Staff

  Levenia has worked for FIPSE since 1981 and is the lead support for the Comprehensive Program and FIPSE's National Advisory Board.

  (202) 502-7668
  levenia.ishmell@ed.gov

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